France!

First of all, let me just say,
France was amazing!

I went with a group from school but it wasn't a 'school thing.' There were five of us going, me and two of my friends, Kayla and her younger sister Perry, and the tour leader's son and his friend. That wasn't enough people in a group so we were put with two other groups, one group was from this Catholic school in Massachusetts and the other was from this school in Vermont. I was happy we'd meet other people, but I was afraid they'd all be weird.

Anyway, the trip was perfect. I took some pictures but I'm a little too lazy to put them up right now.

We had a six hour flight from Boston to London and then an hour flight from London to Paris. I slept for a few hours on both flights but was a little too nervous to sleep all that much. When we got to Paris, we were all pretty tired...and we went right to the Louvre!
The Louvre was amazing, but I wish I had been less tired.
There was so much to see and we kept wanting to sit down and sleep. I did see the Mona Lisa and you know, all the other important stuff. Hahaha so vague...

That night though, we sort of got a second wind. Our hotel was a bit in the ghetto of Paris, but that wasn't too bad. There was this great supermarket nearby and I got this really, really weird yogurt smoothie drink that was kinda eh.

The second day was fun, we did this bus tour of Paris. That was nice, especially since it was raining that day. We went down to the Champs-Elysee and walked around and saw L'Arc de Triomph...oh and we lost one of the kids on the tour. hahahaha
We eventually found him, though!
And at dinner that night, Kayla and I drank beer! It was kind of gross but awesome anyway. I guess you have to be 18 to buy stuff but nobody carded us. But then I bought this cheap thing of scotch from this place across from my hotel and it only said you had to be 16 to buy stuff...

That night was really fun because me, Kayla and Perry were hanging out in our room and then these four guys from Massachusetts came and chilled with us until about three AM. They were all very, very cool and very, very hot. Hahaha.

The next day we went to this town called Tours, which is in the Loire Valley. It was probably the most amazing place, ever. It's a bit like Paris only smaller, and it was soo fun. During the day we visited castles and these really tourist-y towns. They were sooo pretty but they all sort of were the same. This kid Eric who was in my group got these two pictures of me using his panorama function on his camera so in one picture I'm dancing three times and in another I'm fighting myself...hahahaha

Tours at night was AMAZING. The first night I stayed in the hotel while Kayla and Perry went to go call their parents and stuff (I didn't call my parents at all...I felt terrible but I just kept forgetting...) and then everyone just sort...came into our room. Most people had heard about the 4 Mass guys chilling with us until really early so they all came into our room at night.
The teacher from Vermont group came in at 11 and yelled at us to go to bed...everyone left for ten minutes and then came back. Hahahahaha it was soo funny. We were all really paranoid after that she'd come back so everytime we heard the slightest noise, we'd run.

The second night in Tours was so fun. Kayla, Perry and I met up with the Vermont kids because they were going to this billiards place. We followed them and met up with some of the Mass kids. We all hung out and were drinking and it was probably one of the coolest things ever. Cause we were just hanging out, no adults, drinking (legally).
That was when I sort of met this guy, Adrian. We'll we'd talked a bit earlier that night but we started hanging out at the bar. He was so gorgeous and acckk. He was from Vermont but randomly had dated this girl who went to my school. Small world, right?

Then we moved onto this place in Brittany/Bretagne. During the day we stopped at a couple more towns, saw some castles, etc. Kayla wants to be a photographer and she got sooo many cool pictures at the places we stopped. There was this one really amazing one of this alleyway and this light that was hanging down between two buildings. It's an awesome picture. That night we stayed at this resort in the middle of nowhere. That was a little lame that we couldn't go out but we all had fun because we walked around the golf course at night. It was creepy, but fun.

We only stayed one night at the resort and then went to Normandy. We went to the beaches where D-Day happened, I took a rock that I left in my friend's bag...but yeah. We also went to American cemetary, it was really weird. So many white marble crosses, and of course a few jewish stars and stuff but it was creepy. Cool, but creepy. We went to this D-Day museum which was (no offense) pretty dull. We watched a movie and I kept dozing off during it.

The night at the hotel in Normandy was fun. I was with Kayla and Perry but there were only two to a room. Me and Kayla were together but Perry was with some other girl. Anyway, Perry ended up moving into our room. We didn't stay in that room too much, though. We were hanging out with the Mass boys in their enormous room. Oh and that night before we hung out with the Mass boys I took this long walk with Adrian around this neighborhood near our hotel. Hahaha he was telling me this story about how his teacher got mad at them for drinking that one night in Tours and whenever he was talking I kept thinking to myself "Shut up and kiss me!!"

The day after we went back to Paris. It took us most of the day to get there and we went to our hotel. The hotel was called like Premier Classe Hotel but they were crappy rooms. My friends and I had two twin beds and a bunk up top. However, we spent like basically no time in that room.

We went to the Eiffel Tower that night and we went all the way to the top. It was really cool but freezing. We didn't spend too much time up at the top, but Kayla (again) got some awesome pictures. I, of course, forgot my camera.
However, before we went up, the kid who had gotten lost earlier in the trip, who everyone called Jesus because uh, yeah he looked like Jesus...wanted to take my picture because I guess I look just like his sister. Adrian was standing next to me but I didn't expect him to be in the picture. Anyway, Jesus (real name, Wesley - the most badass name, EVER) held up his camera and all of a sudden Adrian just put his arm around my waist and so I was like ACK OKAY and stuff.
(I was pretty surprised because the entire time I'd known Adrian, I'd just kept telling myself that it was pretty stupid to have a crush on him because he did NOT like me, yadda yadda yadda)

That night after the Eiffel tower the Mass kids and us decided we wanted to go to a Discotech (because they have those in Paris). The Mass kids teacher knew of one so we went to this part of Paris that was totally far away from where we were but it was cool. We couldn't get in, though. It wasn't even because we were all too young!! It was because some kids were wearing shorts and you aren't allowed to wear shorts into the Discotech because it's fancy.
We ended up going to this Irish pub across the street. Most kids got carded and couldn't get stuff but me and my friend did. She was 18 anyway, but they didn't card her.

A couple of the Mass guys bought gin from this sketchy liquor store near the Metro stop and brought it back. So we had gin and this cheap Sprite stuff. I'd already had a drink at the Irish pub and so after, me and Kayla were kind of drunk. Perry had gone to bed because she didn't want to drink because her boyfriend is all straightedge and stuff and she was upset anyway. The boys gave her some good relationship advice and she really liked this one kid on the trip and kind of wanted to break up with her boyfriend and stuff. Oh and gin is gross. It tastes like leaves.

I ended up leaving that room with Adrian. We wandered around for a bit, got yelled at by this French dude, and started watching hockey in his room because that was the only thing that we could watch on TV. Then of course Kayla and a few others came in. Perry was sleeping upstairs so we went and woke her up and bothered her for a bit. Then me, Kayla, Adrian and his roomate Dylan (one of the Mass boys who Kayla liked) went back to their room.

Eric, the kid who took those panorama pictures of us were hanging out with us for awhile (he was really annoying and kind of never stopped talking - EVER) but eventually he left. Then Kayla joined Dylan on the top bunk and well...me and Adrian like hooked up. It was amazing. He was the most amazing kisser ever. I can't even describe it. And then Kayla and Dylan hooked up and it was awesome. Adrian wanted me to stay in his room but I was still wearing my jeans and I wanted to change and sleep and obviously it would have been bad if someone had found me and Kayla in their room. But we were freaking out about it when we left their room.

We pretty much got to sleep that night at 5:30AM and woke up at 7.

The next day we had to say goodbye to everyone. That was yesterday. It SUCKED. However, when I said goodbye to Adrian, I hugged him and pulled away and he was like, "Okay, I'm going to do it. I'm going to come up and visit you." I wanted to kiss him but everyone was like looking, so I didn't. I just smiled REALLY widely. Like a total lunatic. Because I'm awkward.

Then we went to Montmartre and got hustled by gypsies. They trapped Kayla, Perry, Eric and I and started talking to us while they were making these bracelets on our pinkies. It wasn't until after that they told it the bracelets cost TEN EUROS. A tiny piece of string for the equivalent of fifteen bucks. I was so pissed that I threw out the bracelet right after. Then of course I thought it would be a fun idea to go see the Moulin Rouge. Our teacher was like "oh yeah, it's like two stops away, we can walk." UH. Half an hour later...we got there. I was wearing a heavy backpack and it was hot and I wasn't wearing sneakers and it was NOT fun.

Then we got lunch and took the subway back to the hotel to get our stuff. The other kids had already left on an earlier plane. Of course, the Metro bus we were on had to be the one that broke down like 8 times. We were on the Metro for over an hour. Eventually we just left and got picked up by the van that was coming to get us. We had to sit in the heat for a half an hour though while we waited to be picked up.

The plane rides were so easy though. I slept for four hours on the long one. It was nice. We ate dinner and just crashed. Of course, we were running on one and half hours of sleep, hahahaha.

So now I'm home.
And it all feels like this bizarre dream. Especially the last night. I keep thinking that it just didn't happen. It all seems like a story I'd write, but like, real life? No way.
The days were fun, but the nights were more fun. It was just amazing to be in this different country with all these new people who we just got along with so well.
France is amazing. The US is so lame in comparison. Seriously.

Okay. The end.
April 25th, 2009 at 05:22pm